September 5, 2025 • 37 mins
Are you ready to dive into the latest gaming buzz? In this episode, we're tackling some hot topics that are shaking up the industry. From the controversial "Quadruple A" game label to the latest updates in popular titles, we've got you covered.
The A-Game Debate
Is "AAA" not enough anymore? We're discussing the recent trend of labeling games as "Quadruple A" and why it might be more hype than substance. Let's break down what this means for the industry and whether it's really necessary.
Game Updates and Releases
Path of Exile 2 and Marvel Rivals
Get the scoop on the latest Path of Exile 2 update and what it means for players. Plus, we're exploring the upcoming season of Marvel Rivals, including new heroes and what to expect.
Helldivers 2 Technical Troubles
We'll dive into the recent performance issues plaguing Helldivers 2 and what the developers are doing to address them.
Spy Games and Lost Potential
Excited about the upcoming 007 First Light? We'll share what we know about this origin story and why it might be the spy game we've been waiting for.
Plus, we'll take a nostalgic look at the Prey 2 that never was, with recently surfaced gameplay footage that has fans wondering what could have been.
Tech Talk
Get ready for a speed boost! We're breaking down Lexar's new gaming-focused SSD and what it means for both gamers and content creators.
Industry Insights
Unfortunately, we can't ignore the ongoing layoffs in the gaming industry. We'll discuss the latest news and what it might mean for upcoming titles.
Key Takeaways:
- The debate over "Quadruple A" game classifications
- Updates on Path of Exile 2, Marvel Rivals, and Helldivers 2
- What to expect from 007 First Light
- A glimpse at the Prey 2 that never was
- New tech for gamers and creators
- The latest on industry layoffs and their potential impact
Join us as we explore these topics and more, offering our take on what's shaping the future of gaming. Whether you're a casual player or a hardcore enthusiast, there's something here for everyone.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
And welcome to a new episode of Digital Coffee Gaming Brew.
And I'm your host, Brett Deister. I got guys always
getting tired of hearing about AAA or now
Quadruple A, and there's just too many of these
A acronyms or too many A's or
whatever. It's just getting a little tiring because
(00:23):
it was standard for years to call it AAA and
no one ever thought anything of it. But we're going to be talking about that
because now another person has brought up Quadruple A
into the sphere because
we just need to actually add an additional A to make it top,
top, top tier. It's going to be fun. But we're also going to be talking
(00:44):
about path of exile 2, the upcoming season four of marvel
rivals. Also going to be talking about he divers two. And
well, it's not going so well with the new Update, unfortunately.
Also 007 first light because there was actually more stuff going
on there. An interesting gameplay footage of prey
2. So the prey that we got from
(01:07):
Arkane Studios is not the original Prey that we've had
before. Original Prey was done by a different
developer called Human Head and they actually were developing
Prey 2, which was going to be a very, very different, more action,
more bounty hunter type game that never came to fruition. But it actually
looked pretty cool and it was unfortunate that it actually never did. So I'm gonna
(01:29):
talk about that. Also be talking about
Lexar's new SSD that is going
to be released that is supposed to be used for gaming
content creation. You know, things.
More layoffs. Because the gaming industry cannot go without
a week without more layoffs.
(01:51):
And yeah, we're going to be talking about the the
Monkey Years of Double A, Triple A and Quadruple A. And why it's ridiculous to
keep on calling it that. But let's get on with the show.
(02:14):
Mmm, that's good. All right guys, I hope you're
having a fantastic Friday, but path of Exile 2 update
titled the Third Edict, launched on August 29th.
This introduced Act 4 of the campaign. Two temporary interlude
acts in the first seasonal league called Rise of the
Abyss. Abysmal developer Grinding Gear
(02:36):
Games released patch
0.3.0 B to address player
feedback and various issues. The patch include changes to the Rise
of the Abysmal Visma League, specifically making certain
enemy abilities more manageable.
The Vessel of Kock Boss
(02:57):
will have its arena wide cleave attack easier to
read and dodge, and its Teleport slam ability will
deal reduced damage. Other enemies such as
Abysmal Stranglers and the shepherd of the Pit will
also have reduced damage from certain abilities. So just a
rebalance. It's adding more story to it because
(03:19):
I got path of exile 2 when it actually released on early access and
it was rough like I was having lag spikes. I
still haven't played it yet just because of just the lag spikes were not
fun to deal with. But it looks like this is a little bit more robust,
a little bit better and a little bit more to what we actually
want to see. Because Pilot bag style, the original one is really
(03:41):
good, has a lot of depth, some
might say better than Diablo 4. The original one, I
don't know. Two's there quite yet. But Diablo 4 is doing better at
letting us be the heroes that we want to be and not just kind of
nerfing everything and making it
basically making the re roll everything
(04:03):
and making it better because they nerf things and it's just never
fun to do. But we'll see how well this actually goes
happens when eventually the road to
1.0 gets released. I'm not sure it's going to be anytime soon because
it takes a while and there's always rebalancing to be had.
But anyways, moving on to Marvel Rivals. Season four
(04:26):
will introduce two heroes, Angela and Daredevil.
Information was confirmed by East Games through an animated
trailer. Angela is implied to be a Vanguard, which they did
confirm in her physical appearance was in trailer. She was very fit.
And then it seems to be Daredevil is going to be
a DPS hero because we need more DPS
(04:49):
heroes and Marvel Rivals. But season four is titled
the Heart of the Dragon is set to launch on September 12th.
Storyline involves a conflict with Angela, demands HeLa's surrender, and
Dr. Doom seeks to steal the chronology
of the dragon show low.
Marvel Rivals is currently available on PS5, Windows
(05:12):
PC, Xbox Series X and will be released
on the PS4. That's right. If you still have a PS4 and you did
not upgrade to the newest consoles, you'll be able to
play Marvel Rivals. So that's where we
have it. So we're actually going to have a flying tank this time with Angela.
Should be interesting. Also has a shield as well. Not really sure how well she's
(05:34):
going to be until we actually get our hands on it in
probably next week. Ish. Next week or the week after,
but it should be interesting to see how well that's actually going to do with
it. And also Daredevil will be a Duelist AKA
DPS and fine. I
mean We. We have way too many DPS right now. Probably need to focus a
(05:55):
little bit more on your healers and your tanks because healers have
been a little bit of a drought. I mean, yeah, you got Ultron, but Ultron
wasn't really wasn't great for healing. You got the drone, but this
drone doesn't really heal that much. It's got AoE heal, which is fine,
but it just doesn't do much. So I would like to see Net east
focus more on the tanks and the healers,
(06:16):
strategists, Vanguard, whatever. It's all the
same monkey. But focus in on that because we need
more of that because just too many DPS SL strategies
right now. There's way too many. I know they're probably the easier
ones to actually make because a lot of Marvel heroes seem to be more
fit in the duelist
(06:38):
role, but need to have more vanguard and strategists.
Just gonna throw it out there. Need more of those, less of the DPS.
All right, moving on to Helldivers 2 and apparently
there's been some technical performance issues. The
CEO did say that it has referred to the technical debt
(06:59):
as crippling and knowledge. The game has been experienced performance
issues since the Omens of Tyranny update. The game
is now available on three platforms. They just released it on Xbox and
there is a Halo type of
crossover, premium
DLC or loot box or whatever.
(07:22):
And he also stated that with the Xbox release completed, the team can focus more
on stabilizing the game and is looking at to add more resources for
this purpose. Good idea. Because having terrible
issues like that does not help whatsoever.
So do I still think
Helldivers 2 is great? Yeah, it's great fun. I mean, yeah, it's not as
(07:45):
popular as when it first released, but man, is it so fun to just drop
in the game and have fun with a bunch of different people and do your
thing for democracy. Because it is always important to fight for
democracy. But yeah, it's. It is an issue. The
other issue is, is that they are on a defunct now game engine that
is no longer really working. So I don't. I don't think that
(08:07):
helps it, but I don't think there is an easy way to transfer it
over. There is another game that has been on that
game engine too and that was Fat
sharks, basically Warhammer 40K version
of the original game mode. So that. So
there are two different games that are working in that specific game engine that is
(08:29):
no longer being updated on. So it does not
help with that. But yes. The debt of
not having it as optimized as it could be does
not help them because it basically drives more players away.
Because it's like I'm experiencing a lot of issues. I don't
have to deal with fixing this issues anymore. It's not like the old times
(08:52):
back in like the 90s where you would be like, oh, it's a bug. How
do I fix this? Now we just want everything to work. I still go
through and figure out how to do it, but sometimes it is very frustrating because
it gets a lot more technical. You, you sometimes you have to go through
the ini files, but sometimes that doesn't even work because then it can mess up
things. So it's a lot of issues all around and I just
(09:13):
hope that they fix it because hell, Divers two is a great game.
I'm glad they keep on updating and making more new creatures and interesting creatures
because that is a really great thing to do. But
yeah, you got to optimize it. I mean it's
one of those things where today modern gaming, I'm talking about from like
(09:34):
from 2020 to now, most
developers don't really optimize their games very well.
It's sad. And I don't think Unreal Engine 5 has helped that issue
either. I think that plus the inception of fsr,
dlss, xess, all the AI upscaling
stuff has really made it
(09:56):
easy or basically made
developers a little bit more lazy optimizing it. They've just
kind of used those as like, oh, we don't need to optimize as much. We'll
just have our, our DLSS or
FSR XCSS do it for us so we don't actually
have to do it. And so that's what actually makes it worse because
(10:18):
it's like, no, I need you to actually optimize it
and then actually have it, the DLSS and all that stuff as
an extra bonus to make it even more efficient. So those
tools should make it more efficient, not be the, this is the
efficiency model because when you do that you
run into a lot more problems instead of just making it more efficient.
(10:41):
So I think the past five years we've kind of like seen that it's just
the laziness of making it more optimized has kind of been by the
wayside because of these other technologies that
supposed to help it. But it doesn't really help it as much as just making
the game optimized for the system. And it's
usually just because of PC because we have a Wide range
(11:03):
of all these different types of CPUs, motherboards,
GPUs, RAM and everything else. It does
make it harder to do it, but you
shouldn't still not optimize it. Yeah, it's a lot
harder, I'll give you that, but doesn't mean that you don't
optimize your game at all. Foreign
(11:28):
Moving on to 007. First light is
being developed by IO Interactive. Known for the Hitman series, the
game was previously referred to by working title Project Project
7. There's been new information about that.
007 First Light is scheduled to be released on March
27, 2026. The game will will tell the origin stories
(11:51):
of James Bond. So we're going to go through that. But first from a
different person, a different type of James Bond. This is kind of like
a different way of doing it that's not from
the movies. Basically that's how I'm seeing this.
There are plans for the game to potentially start a new trilogy. So
(12:11):
if it does well, we'll get two extra games from
this, maybe more. We'll see.
But from what I've seen, looks like it could be good.
Now, I usually refer to IO Interactive as probably more the
premier studios for doing actually like
spy stealth, espionage games. It used to be
(12:33):
Kenobi with Kojima through Metal Gear, but
that's not really a thing anymore. I know they just released Metal Gear Solid,
Delta, Snake Eater, but that was just a remake from
Kojima and. And what he did was amazing job.
It's still kind of funny to play an old Metal Gear Solid Snake Eater
when a lot of times the stealth is just
(12:55):
laying down low in the middle of the thing and the person doesn't recognize you
because you have the right camo. But I'm like, yeah, but yeah, you can tell
that I'm just laying there. I'll have
my review on that later. Later. I'm still going through it, but it is
pretty funny at times to see it. But right now all I can
say is that this developer is the premier developer for
(13:17):
that stealth one. Arcane was. But I haven't
really heard any them making any games really.
And I mean they were great at what they were doing
with this dishonored. Dishonor was a great STEALTH Action
Type 1. And I mean like you said, you had Metal
(13:38):
Gear developer doing it, but they don't do it anymore.
I mean they do remake, but it's a remake from a game that's already
been done.
So we really don't have any. I mean Ubisoft doesn't do Splinter
Cell anymore. I mean you have games that have stealth
like features, but not like stealth like it is the main thing
(14:01):
besides Hitman and Hitman series is the only one that I know of, of
recent that is stealth first
action later. And we don't. I don't
see any other developer really doing that. I could be wrong, but
I don't from my recollection know any other developer doing
that. And I think that's a travesty because like
(14:22):
espionage stealth type of genre is sorely lacking.
I know it's in favor of Call of Duty Battlefield because those are the big
hits, but there still is room for that. Like there's still room for
strategy games, RTS, turn based strategy games.
There are still rooms for RPGs as boulders. Gate 3 is a
prime example of doing isometric old 90s
(14:45):
style games like that into the future
or turn based RPGs like Expedition
33. Everything old can be new again because a lot of the younger
generation has never played those types of games. And so when they
play them they're like, oh, this is amazing. I wish they would make more of
these and a lot of times they don't because of something. But
(15:08):
I'm optimistic and excited.
But I really want to see more of what 007 is
going to bring and how they're going to portray him and how they're going to
respect what the series has laid before.
So we'll see what happens. But I'm still optimistic
about it. I still think it's gonna. It could be a good game, but
(15:31):
we'll see.
All right, moving on to. There is gameplay footage of
Prey 2. Now I kind of alluded to it in the beginning, but Prey 2
was developed by Human Head and they made the original one
where you were Native American. You got abducted in this alien
ship and then they had like. There was like certain like pass
(15:54):
where you could walk up walls. It was a very
interesting game. It was, it was still fun, but it was very
interesting. Very. Could be vomit inducing
if because. Or vertical inducing because you're just going up
on walls up, up on
ceilings. I mean it was crazy what you could do with it. It
(16:14):
was interesting game. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I actually beat that one.
But they eventually were the. The same studio was going to be making
prey 2 and so
the game, well, it just never
happened, Bethesda said, because that was the publisher at the
time when they were still a private company. They just said that the game
(16:36):
wasn't there. They weren't Happy with Human Head something or something or
other. And they gave it to Arcane Studios. And they. Arcane Studios made it
very different Prey, but the developer didn't really
want to name it Prey. They were kind of forced to name it Prey for
whatever reason. Still fun game, still a great game. I think they should have named
it anything else but Prey, because Prey was a very different game
(16:58):
from what Arkane Studio was doing. However, the development
of Prey 2 ceased in 2011, with the game reportedly
close to an alpha stake. According to Chris
Reinhardt, co founder of Human Head, the game was officially
canceled in 2014 following a statement from Peter Hines
indicating the game that the game did not meet expectations.
(17:21):
Many original Human Head developers later joined Zenimax Online
Studios, the developers of Elder Scrolls Online. Earlier in the year,
many of the developers were laid off during Microsoft cuts. That's
brutal. Which also led to the cancellation of a new sci
fi RPG called Blackbird that had elements reminiscent of
Prey too. Man, this game cannot get launched
(17:43):
whatsoever. It's going to be like the vaporware of the
current era, like good and Evil
2. Man, that game, Ubisoft is like, yeah, we're making
it. We're making it. Yeah. We've never seen anything beyond like some
CGI trailers, which is still kind of funny. That come on, saying they're making
it, but you never see anything about it. It was what Doom Duke Nukem
(18:05):
Forever was. Man, that game in the 90s, like the
Duke Nukem 3D was great. And then they were trying to
3D realms, was trying to make Duke
Nukem Forever, but they just kept on changing
the stupid engine and it kept on being delayed,
delayed, delayed, delayed, delayed until Gearbox
(18:28):
bought the rights, finally released Duke Newman
Forever. And man, it was terrible. I didn't even want to play it
just by the reviews. It was like the jokes were just
so old that it just. The references just didn't really hit.
The gameplay was just not great. It was
just bad all around. Might want to play if
(18:51):
it's like a dollar again, just to see how bad it is. But man,
did that. Was that kind of like the.
The vaporware games of, like, from the late
90s to like 2016? Like, is this going to be
another Duke Nuum Forever now? It's going to be now it should be. Is this
going to be another good or. Or evil beyond or what?
(19:12):
That one from Ubisoft 2, is that going to be like, that's going to
be the new one and this is going to be the new one too, because
it's so unfortunate because this looks like it could have been a really good
game, but supposedly it was not
a good state. We don't really know because the
publisher saying that it's not a good state does not really
(19:34):
lend a lot of like, confidence in it. Because it could be
good. The, the publishers or the higher ups just don't know how to play it
or it could be terrible and they're just like, this is not good. We
just don't really know. But man, going from human head to doing
Prey 2 to going to ZeniMax Online Studios to being laid
off when Bethesda was bought out. Brutal.
(19:57):
Feel sorry for you guys, but that's
where we're at. All right, so
Lexar is launching The Aries Pro M
22280 PCIe
E 5.0 NVMe SSD because
names don't matter for these things. Product
(20:19):
was revealed at Gamescom 2025. The SSD is going to be using
gen 5x4 interface.
Larry's Pro SSD is available in three sizes. The 1 terabyte, 2
terabyte, 4 terabyte. The 1 terabyte version has speed reads up to
14,000 megabytes per second. Read speeds up to
7,500 megabytes per second. The 2 terabyte model is up
(20:41):
to same 1,14,000 megabytes per second. For read
speed, the write speed is 10,000 megabytes per second. And
the 4 terabyte model, it can write up to 11,000
megabytes per second. It's going to be the same speed as
the previous ones. The 1 TB model can handle
1600k random read operations and
(21:04):
1000 random write operations. The the
2 TB model can handle 2000 random read
operations and 1400 random write operations. And the
4K model can handle 2000 random read operations
& 1500 random write operations per
second. So
(21:26):
the drives are expected to last for
1.5 million hours before failing. That's
quite a bit. And the SSD is compatible with Microsoft Direct Storage. It if
the computer meets the requirements. So you have that as well.
And this is supposed to bridge the gap between gaming and content
creation. If it does and if it reads at
(21:47):
those speeds, great. But it's an
SSD drive doesn't have to be specific to gaming or content creation. If it's just
fast, who cares? But I mean, they have to do this. So they can either
charge more or make it sound better. I mean, I get it.
You're marketing it to a specific
group of people. And you need to make it sound like it's fast. It's going
(22:09):
to work great for gaming and content creation. And
it only does 1 terabyte, 2 terabyte and 4 terabytes. So it's going to be
expensive because when you get into
terabyte range for NVMEs,
it always is more expensive. So
if you're looking for one, you're gonna, it's gonna cost you a pretty
(22:32):
penny, but it could meet your standards.
To me, I think it's only really good for like
storage or if you're gonna be doing like, need something
really fast to do a lot of like video data
through it or if you just wanna boot it up as your main drive for
your computer. I really don't see much of it from a
(22:55):
gaming perspective because it just doesn't seem like it uses
all of it to be really worth it. On that side of it, you could
use a standard ssd, not an mvme, but an
SSD and you really wouldn't know the difference.
So we'll see how well these actually do. But it's good they actually using
Microsoft Direct storage. So at least you get that bonus if you want
(23:17):
to spend the money. No real word on what it's going to
cost, but it's probably going to cost, I would say $400 to
$800, give or take.
All right, moving on to layoffs. So
Firaxis Games is going through layoffs, the developer of the
civilization series, because Civ 7 did not meet expectations
(23:40):
whatsoever. And the spokesman stated that there was a staff
reduction as Studio restructures and optimizes its development process.
The exact number of layoffs is not disclosed, but sources indicate
that dozens of workers have been affected. Several developers, including
Emma Kidwell, Logan Blackwood,
Matthew Davis and Maya H, have publicly mentioned being laid
(24:03):
off on LinkedIn. Take Two, the parent company of
2K, projected about 5%
growth in revenue and net bookings for the year ending March
31, 2025, despite delaying Grand Theft Auto
6 to 2026. Other studios under
2K, such as Cat Daddy Games and Cloud Chamber, have also
(24:26):
experienced layoffs in 2025. A Bloomberg report indicated
that BioShock 4 recently failed a publisher review,
which led to leadership changes and concerns about potential
layoffs. Yeah, is that looking good for BioShock
4? Because looks like
it did not meet the standards whatsoever and looks like it's going to be a
(24:48):
long way off for we actually see anything about it. So
if you're looking for a new BioShock, you're going to be waiting a very long
time for a new BioShock. Unfortunately Kevin Levine is not
really. Or his development studio isn't really involved with this
whatsoever. Last one was a while
ago. I don't remember the name of it but it was. It was basically the
(25:10):
sky one. I didn't really like the story very much. I thought it was
pedantic and didn't really understand
religion very well. But the
game, the gameplay was great. Just the story was just a mess
and it was a. It was a philosophical mess of
just inaccuracies and. And just. It was just trite
(25:32):
religion as like the main thing was just. Was just right.
It's been done before and I it was dumb.
I love Kevin living it all. I love that he made like all the. All
the great games of Thief and
was that superhero one. It was Freedom Force. That's what it was
that one and other ones
(25:56):
like System Shock as well. He was part of
that one. Like he made a lot of great games. No
hate for him. It's just that story just did not resonate with me. I
the original BioShock story was great. BioShock 2 was okay.
And then this one which I don't remember the name BioShock something I
don't really remember the name story was just
(26:18):
not as good. But the original
BioShock great story would
probably should just remake that one to be honest with you
would help out so much. But moving on to
the main thing about the stupid monkey
(26:38):
titles of AAA Double A now again
Quadruple A. So the co founder of
developer Digital referred to GTA 6 as quadruple
A game suggesting it surpasses traditional
AAA game and budget cultural impact and scope.
You could say that for the Witcher 3. You could say that for Metal Gear.
(27:01):
You could say that for Bioshock. You could say it for a lot of them.
It's Grand Theft Auto is not
in a pinnacle of its own. Like you could say Call of
Duty has a bigger cultural impact than or I
wouldn't say bigger but it was. It's on par with it
because every time it comes out with a new game every year,
(27:23):
people buy it a lot. They play it a lot. It has a huge
cultural impact. I get that Grand Theft Auto has its
own little thing, but if we're talking about real cultural impact,
I think it's not as big as some of the other ones.
Like design wise it started
the open world game. I'll give it that. It did a great job of starting
(27:45):
that and that is the biggest cultural impact it's had.
Satire, fine, but I mean, no one really remembers the satire of it
that much. As much as it has. They remember, like the
gameplay. They remember basically
being open world, doing what you want with stealing cars, and
basically treating horrors like terribly and all that other stuff
(28:08):
it. It did. That's the cultural impact that it's actually had.
But there's been other ones. I mean, System Shock
was not as big because gaming wasn't as big as it was when System Shock
came out. But it was still a cultural impact in the gaming community.
Now you're talking about the biggest cultural impacts. Halo, Call of
(28:28):
Duty are probably the two biggest ones that have
had major impact. Then you have Fortnite. That has a major
cultural impact because just of the inflection point that it did,
Overwatch, with hero shooters making it extremely
popular than Marvel Rivals, because it's bringing Marvel to
gaming in a good way as well.
(28:50):
Witcher 3 on RPGs because of the way it
handled tough storylines and just kind
of the more, I guess, dark fantasy
versions of it. And then you have Mass Effect
and kind of the Space Odyssey and that cultural impact on it.
Like you've had a lot of different ones and they all had their very specific
(29:11):
impact. But to say that GTA
itself is like the pinnacle of cultural impact.
Not really so. But it does have a cultural impact.
You cannot deny that. But it's like the scope of it.
I mean, you could say Red Dead Redemption 2 has had a
huge cultural impact too. I mean, these all. All these games have had
(29:34):
different cultural impacts at certain times.
But to say I'm thinking about like all these games all the time. No, I
mean here and gone, basically. I
mean, a lot of people still play GTA 5 because of the online
component of it. And that's great, but
(29:54):
to me,
and maybe because I'm older, but it just doesn't have. Maybe because I just
never finished a GTA game. I don't know why I. I
go play it and then I just never finish it.
I don't know why I never finish it. I think I just get bored or
something else that I really want to play goes. And I just forget about it.
(30:15):
And I go, oh, crap, I gotta finish. I gotta restart this game because I
have no idea how to do anything anymore. I mean, it's not that.
That hard of a game to figure out. It's just. I just forget
about it every time. I never
finished. I've never finished a Grand Theft Auto game.
Never. I finished Ghost of Tsushima like
(30:36):
four times. I finished Witcher 3, like four times.
I finished Dragon Age Origins several times. I mean, there's
different games. I finished way more often than I did with that. But
anyways, it doesn't need a new
Monkear. Like Ubisoft tried to do this. It didn't
work. They don't need to do this again. Yes.
(31:00):
Is Grand Theft Auto the pinnacle of AAA games? Yes.
Is it on par with a lot of other pinnacles of AAA games?
Yes. Like Call of Duty, like Halo, like
Fortnite. You could definitely consider Fortnite a AAA game.
It just never ends. But you have like the top tier of
them. Some good, some bad. I
(31:22):
would not put Call of Duty as a good category. I would just call it
because of the cultural impact of it, of there's gonna be a movie
about it of every year.
There's a huge swath of ads and Mountain
Dew and all these other product placements for it. I mean,
if you want to talk about cultural impact, it's when
(31:44):
like Mountain Dew and all Rockstar and all these other ones
put codes in it for your game. That
to me is a huge cultural impact because it's transcending
just that, gaming like Grand Theft Auto. I don't
remember anything and I could be wrong, but I don't remember any
other product placement outside of the game.
(32:07):
Call of Duty. Tons of them.
But I could be wrong and it could change from this one, but we'll
see. Now, will I say that Call of Duty or.
Excuse me, Grand Theft Auto has never had cultural like. No,
no, no. It's a huge cultural impact. I mean, like I said before,
it was the start of the open world game. I mean, that's what popularized
(32:30):
open world. We've never looked back from it after that. After
Grand Theft Auto 3. I mean, that game was a
surprise hit from nowhere that
nobody saw coming. And there were two other games before that and it was a
top down, isometric type of quote unquote open world game. But it did
not have the impact of Grand Theft Auto 3 had. Once
(32:52):
Grand Theft Auto. Grand Theft Auto 3 was released. That
changed everything. That is the cultural point.
But beyond that, I don't really know what else is
there except for it's good. It. It's a very expensive game now,
I think upwards to a billion dollars, I think I've heard. So
(33:12):
it should be a good game. Yes, the gaming industry,
like waits for this game, but we also wait for Call of Duty because we
know it comes out every year. But like, culturally,
I don't Know of a lot of other points that I could
make for this one, and maybe I'm far off on this one, but I.
(33:34):
As a cultural point to it or cultural impact,
I see more cultural impacts from Call of Duty, not because it's a good game,
just because it comes out every year. And just like I said before, I see
more impacts because of where
it's branched out from.
(33:55):
I don't see many things branching out from Grand Theft Auto, if I'm being
really honest. I see games have imitated them,
but games have also imitated Call of Duty. Call of Duty 2 was the first
time we saw regenerative, regenerative health. Before
it was health packs. Kind of like what Overwatch and
Marvel Rivals does, health packs. But then Call of Duty 2 did
(34:18):
regenerative health, where you didn't have to do health packs anymore. And that
was a game changer. When Call of Duty 2 came out,
when Call of Duty 4 came out, that's when they did their kill streaks
and everything. And that was a huge impact on gaming because that
changed Call of Duty forever. And then it just got
more popular and more popular and more popular. This is before they did every year
(34:41):
release. And then after, I think Modern Warfare 2, they did a yearly release
and it got more popular. The inflection point for even then was then Black
Ops, because that was an interesting thing. And then
there are a few other ones. And I think modern warfare in
2019 was another huge cultural moment within
Call of Duty. But even for Grand Theft Auto, the cultural
(35:04):
impacts is every five years or so,
there's a new game from them in the. In the
Grand Theft Auto world. I know they. They do a lot
of painstaking things to make this game really good. But
beyond just the release of games, I don't know what other
(35:25):
cultural impacts it actually has had. Beyond
when three came out and you people were
like, oh, you could do this because it's open world. That was the novelty of
it. And then online, where you could play with
friends, do things, do crazy things. That was another cultural impact.
(35:46):
But six, I mean, it's still a question mark and how good
it's actually going to be. Are people gonna buy it? Of course they are. It's
Grand Theft Auto. It's like Call of Duty. When that thing comes out, you're like,
bye. Not so much Call of Duty anymore, but it used to be Call of
Duty used to be that way for a lot of people.
But I'm just sick and tired of
(36:07):
quadruple A or 5A games or whatever. We're going to monk here.
Just leave it. AAA games. People understand the term stop
making more A's just because you're trying to say it's this pinnacle
of something because it just gets convoluted. Nobody really
cares anymore. It's.
It's aaa. It's top tier aaa, but it's aaa.
(36:31):
So where is this all going? Well, we'll see when grabs that auto
six comes out. How much of a cultural impact this will have being
so far gone from when five came out to this one. How
well it's received by gamers, how much of an impact it has
on the general society of it. Because
I can guarantee you people know Call of Duty more than they
(36:54):
know Grand Theft Auto. Because Call of Duty is just everywhere that
cultural impact is felt. This one
not as much, but there is impact on it. And
that's where I stand on this. I'm not saying that Call of Duty is great.
I'm just talking about impact in general.
But what do you think? Do you think I just missed the boat and
(37:17):
Grand Theft Auto has a bigger cultural impact than I think could happen?
Let me know in the comments below. But thank you for listening to Digital
Coffee Gaming Brew. I really do appreciate it. As always. Please subscribe to this podcast
and all your favorite podcasting apps. If you 5 star review will disrupt the rankings.
Let me know how I'm doing and join me next week as I talk about
what's going on in the PC gaming industry. All right guys, stay safe. Get to
(37:37):
playing the games you want to play and see you next week later.
And welcome to a new episode of Digital Coffee Gaming Brew.
And I'm your host, Brett Deister. I got guys always
getting tired of hearing about AAA or now
Quadruple A, and there's just too many of these
A acronyms or too many A's or
whatever. It's just getting a little tiring because
(00:23):
it was standard for years to call it AAA and
no one ever thought anything of it. But we're going to be talking about that
because now another person has brought up Quadruple A
into the sphere because
we just need to actually add an additional A to make it top,
top, top tier. It's going to be fun. But we're also going to be talking
(00:44):
about path of exile 2, the upcoming season four of marvel
rivals. Also going to be talking about he divers two. And
well, it's not going so well with the new Update, unfortunately.
Also 007 first light because there was actually more stuff going
on there. An interesting gameplay footage of prey
2. So the prey that we got from
(01:07):
Arkane Studios is not the original Prey that we've had
before. Original Prey was done by a different
developer called Human Head and they actually were developing
Prey 2, which was going to be a very, very different, more action,
more bounty hunter type game that never came to fruition. But it actually
looked pretty cool and it was unfortunate that it actually never did. So I'm gonna
(01:29):
talk about that. Also be talking about
Lexar's new SSD that is going
to be released that is supposed to be used for gaming
content creation. You know, things.
More layoffs. Because the gaming industry cannot go without
a week without more layoffs.
(01:51):
And yeah, we're going to be talking about the the
Monkey Years of Double A, Triple A and Quadruple A. And why it's ridiculous to
keep on calling it that. But let's get on with the show.
(02:14):
Mmm, that's good. All right guys, I hope you're
having a fantastic Friday, but path of Exile 2 update
titled the Third Edict, launched on August 29th.
This introduced Act 4 of the campaign. Two temporary interlude
acts in the first seasonal league called Rise of the
Abyss. Abysmal developer Grinding Gear
(02:36):
Games released patch
0.3.0 B to address player
feedback and various issues. The patch include changes to the Rise
of the Abysmal Visma League, specifically making certain
enemy abilities more manageable.
The Vessel of Kock Boss
(02:57):
will have its arena wide cleave attack easier to
read and dodge, and its Teleport slam ability will
deal reduced damage. Other enemies such as
Abysmal Stranglers and the shepherd of the Pit will
also have reduced damage from certain abilities. So just a
rebalance. It's adding more story to it because
(03:19):
I got path of exile 2 when it actually released on early access and
it was rough like I was having lag spikes. I
still haven't played it yet just because of just the lag spikes were not
fun to deal with. But it looks like this is a little bit more robust,
a little bit better and a little bit more to what we actually
want to see. Because Pilot bag style, the original one is really
(03:41):
good, has a lot of depth, some
might say better than Diablo 4. The original one, I
don't know. Two's there quite yet. But Diablo 4 is doing better at
letting us be the heroes that we want to be and not just kind of
nerfing everything and making it
basically making the re roll everything
(04:03):
and making it better because they nerf things and it's just never
fun to do. But we'll see how well this actually goes
happens when eventually the road to
1.0 gets released. I'm not sure it's going to be anytime soon because
it takes a while and there's always rebalancing to be had.
But anyways, moving on to Marvel Rivals. Season four
(04:26):
will introduce two heroes, Angela and Daredevil.
Information was confirmed by East Games through an animated
trailer. Angela is implied to be a Vanguard, which they did
confirm in her physical appearance was in trailer. She was very fit.
And then it seems to be Daredevil is going to be
a DPS hero because we need more DPS
(04:49):
heroes and Marvel Rivals. But season four is titled
the Heart of the Dragon is set to launch on September 12th.
Storyline involves a conflict with Angela, demands HeLa's surrender, and
Dr. Doom seeks to steal the chronology
of the dragon show low.
Marvel Rivals is currently available on PS5, Windows
(05:12):
PC, Xbox Series X and will be released
on the PS4. That's right. If you still have a PS4 and you did
not upgrade to the newest consoles, you'll be able to
play Marvel Rivals. So that's where we
have it. So we're actually going to have a flying tank this time with Angela.
Should be interesting. Also has a shield as well. Not really sure how well she's
(05:34):
going to be until we actually get our hands on it in
probably next week. Ish. Next week or the week after,
but it should be interesting to see how well that's actually going to do with
it. And also Daredevil will be a Duelist AKA
DPS and fine. I
mean We. We have way too many DPS right now. Probably need to focus a
(05:55):
little bit more on your healers and your tanks because healers have
been a little bit of a drought. I mean, yeah, you got Ultron, but Ultron
wasn't really wasn't great for healing. You got the drone, but this
drone doesn't really heal that much. It's got AoE heal, which is fine,
but it just doesn't do much. So I would like to see Net east
focus more on the tanks and the healers,
(06:16):
strategists, Vanguard, whatever. It's all the
same monkey. But focus in on that because we need
more of that because just too many DPS SL strategies
right now. There's way too many. I know they're probably the easier
ones to actually make because a lot of Marvel heroes seem to be more
fit in the duelist
(06:38):
role, but need to have more vanguard and strategists.
Just gonna throw it out there. Need more of those, less of the DPS.
All right, moving on to Helldivers 2 and apparently
there's been some technical performance issues. The
CEO did say that it has referred to the technical debt
(06:59):
as crippling and knowledge. The game has been experienced performance
issues since the Omens of Tyranny update. The game
is now available on three platforms. They just released it on Xbox and
there is a Halo type of
crossover, premium
DLC or loot box or whatever.
(07:22):
And he also stated that with the Xbox release completed, the team can focus more
on stabilizing the game and is looking at to add more resources for
this purpose. Good idea. Because having terrible
issues like that does not help whatsoever.
So do I still think
Helldivers 2 is great? Yeah, it's great fun. I mean, yeah, it's not as
(07:45):
popular as when it first released, but man, is it so fun to just drop
in the game and have fun with a bunch of different people and do your
thing for democracy. Because it is always important to fight for
democracy. But yeah, it's. It is an issue. The
other issue is, is that they are on a defunct now game engine that
is no longer really working. So I don't. I don't think that
(08:07):
helps it, but I don't think there is an easy way to transfer it
over. There is another game that has been on that
game engine too and that was Fat
sharks, basically Warhammer 40K version
of the original game mode. So that. So
there are two different games that are working in that specific game engine that is
(08:29):
no longer being updated on. So it does not
help with that. But yes. The debt of
not having it as optimized as it could be does
not help them because it basically drives more players away.
Because it's like I'm experiencing a lot of issues. I don't
have to deal with fixing this issues anymore. It's not like the old times
(08:52):
back in like the 90s where you would be like, oh, it's a bug. How
do I fix this? Now we just want everything to work. I still go
through and figure out how to do it, but sometimes it is very frustrating because
it gets a lot more technical. You, you sometimes you have to go through
the ini files, but sometimes that doesn't even work because then it can mess up
things. So it's a lot of issues all around and I just
(09:13):
hope that they fix it because hell, Divers two is a great game.
I'm glad they keep on updating and making more new creatures and interesting creatures
because that is a really great thing to do. But
yeah, you got to optimize it. I mean it's
one of those things where today modern gaming, I'm talking about from like
(09:34):
from 2020 to now, most
developers don't really optimize their games very well.
It's sad. And I don't think Unreal Engine 5 has helped that issue
either. I think that plus the inception of fsr,
dlss, xess, all the AI upscaling
stuff has really made it
(09:56):
easy or basically made
developers a little bit more lazy optimizing it. They've just
kind of used those as like, oh, we don't need to optimize as much. We'll
just have our, our DLSS or
FSR XCSS do it for us so we don't actually
have to do it. And so that's what actually makes it worse because
(10:18):
it's like, no, I need you to actually optimize it
and then actually have it, the DLSS and all that stuff as
an extra bonus to make it even more efficient. So those
tools should make it more efficient, not be the, this is the
efficiency model because when you do that you
run into a lot more problems instead of just making it more efficient.
(10:41):
So I think the past five years we've kind of like seen that it's just
the laziness of making it more optimized has kind of been by the
wayside because of these other technologies that
supposed to help it. But it doesn't really help it as much as just making
the game optimized for the system. And it's
usually just because of PC because we have a Wide range
(11:03):
of all these different types of CPUs, motherboards,
GPUs, RAM and everything else. It does
make it harder to do it, but you
shouldn't still not optimize it. Yeah, it's a lot
harder, I'll give you that, but doesn't mean that you don't
optimize your game at all. Foreign
(11:28):
Moving on to 007. First light is
being developed by IO Interactive. Known for the Hitman series, the
game was previously referred to by working title Project Project
7. There's been new information about that.
007 First Light is scheduled to be released on March
27, 2026. The game will will tell the origin stories
(11:51):
of James Bond. So we're going to go through that. But first from a
different person, a different type of James Bond. This is kind of like
a different way of doing it that's not from
the movies. Basically that's how I'm seeing this.
There are plans for the game to potentially start a new trilogy. So
(12:11):
if it does well, we'll get two extra games from
this, maybe more. We'll see.
But from what I've seen, looks like it could be good.
Now, I usually refer to IO Interactive as probably more the
premier studios for doing actually like
spy stealth, espionage games. It used to be
(12:33):
Kenobi with Kojima through Metal Gear, but
that's not really a thing anymore. I know they just released Metal Gear Solid,
Delta, Snake Eater, but that was just a remake from
Kojima and. And what he did was amazing job.
It's still kind of funny to play an old Metal Gear Solid Snake Eater
when a lot of times the stealth is just
(12:55):
laying down low in the middle of the thing and the person doesn't recognize you
because you have the right camo. But I'm like, yeah, but yeah, you can tell
that I'm just laying there. I'll have
my review on that later. Later. I'm still going through it, but it is
pretty funny at times to see it. But right now all I can
say is that this developer is the premier developer for
(13:17):
that stealth one. Arcane was. But I haven't
really heard any them making any games really.
And I mean they were great at what they were doing
with this dishonored. Dishonor was a great STEALTH Action
Type 1. And I mean like you said, you had Metal
(13:38):
Gear developer doing it, but they don't do it anymore.
I mean they do remake, but it's a remake from a game that's already
been done.
So we really don't have any. I mean Ubisoft doesn't do Splinter
Cell anymore. I mean you have games that have stealth
like features, but not like stealth like it is the main thing
(14:01):
besides Hitman and Hitman series is the only one that I know of, of
recent that is stealth first
action later. And we don't. I don't
see any other developer really doing that. I could be wrong, but
I don't from my recollection know any other developer doing
that. And I think that's a travesty because like
(14:22):
espionage stealth type of genre is sorely lacking.
I know it's in favor of Call of Duty Battlefield because those are the big
hits, but there still is room for that. Like there's still room for
strategy games, RTS, turn based strategy games.
There are still rooms for RPGs as boulders. Gate 3 is a
prime example of doing isometric old 90s
(14:45):
style games like that into the future
or turn based RPGs like Expedition
33. Everything old can be new again because a lot of the younger
generation has never played those types of games. And so when they
play them they're like, oh, this is amazing. I wish they would make more of
these and a lot of times they don't because of something. But
(15:08):
I'm optimistic and excited.
But I really want to see more of what 007 is
going to bring and how they're going to portray him and how they're going to
respect what the series has laid before.
So we'll see what happens. But I'm still optimistic
about it. I still think it's gonna. It could be a good game, but
(15:31):
we'll see.
All right, moving on to. There is gameplay footage of
Prey 2. Now I kind of alluded to it in the beginning, but Prey 2
was developed by Human Head and they made the original one
where you were Native American. You got abducted in this alien
ship and then they had like. There was like certain like pass
(15:54):
where you could walk up walls. It was a very
interesting game. It was, it was still fun, but it was very
interesting. Very. Could be vomit inducing
if because. Or vertical inducing because you're just going up
on walls up, up on
ceilings. I mean it was crazy what you could do with it. It
(16:14):
was interesting game. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I actually beat that one.
But they eventually were the. The same studio was going to be making
prey 2 and so
the game, well, it just never
happened, Bethesda said, because that was the publisher at the
time when they were still a private company. They just said that the game
(16:36):
wasn't there. They weren't Happy with Human Head something or something or
other. And they gave it to Arcane Studios. And they. Arcane Studios made it
very different Prey, but the developer didn't really
want to name it Prey. They were kind of forced to name it Prey for
whatever reason. Still fun game, still a great game. I think they should have named
it anything else but Prey, because Prey was a very different game
(16:58):
from what Arkane Studio was doing. However, the development
of Prey 2 ceased in 2011, with the game reportedly
close to an alpha stake. According to Chris
Reinhardt, co founder of Human Head, the game was officially
canceled in 2014 following a statement from Peter Hines
indicating the game that the game did not meet expectations.
(17:21):
Many original Human Head developers later joined Zenimax Online
Studios, the developers of Elder Scrolls Online. Earlier in the year,
many of the developers were laid off during Microsoft cuts. That's
brutal. Which also led to the cancellation of a new sci
fi RPG called Blackbird that had elements reminiscent of
Prey too. Man, this game cannot get launched
(17:43):
whatsoever. It's going to be like the vaporware of the
current era, like good and Evil
2. Man, that game, Ubisoft is like, yeah, we're making
it. We're making it. Yeah. We've never seen anything beyond like some
CGI trailers, which is still kind of funny. That come on, saying they're making
it, but you never see anything about it. It was what Doom Duke Nukem
(18:05):
Forever was. Man, that game in the 90s, like the
Duke Nukem 3D was great. And then they were trying to
3D realms, was trying to make Duke
Nukem Forever, but they just kept on changing
the stupid engine and it kept on being delayed,
delayed, delayed, delayed, delayed until Gearbox
(18:28):
bought the rights, finally released Duke Newman
Forever. And man, it was terrible. I didn't even want to play it
just by the reviews. It was like the jokes were just
so old that it just. The references just didn't really hit.
The gameplay was just not great. It was
just bad all around. Might want to play if
(18:51):
it's like a dollar again, just to see how bad it is. But man,
did that. Was that kind of like the.
The vaporware games of, like, from the late
90s to like 2016? Like, is this going to be
another Duke Nuum Forever now? It's going to be now it should be. Is this
going to be another good or. Or evil beyond or what?
(19:12):
That one from Ubisoft 2, is that going to be like, that's going to
be the new one and this is going to be the new one too, because
it's so unfortunate because this looks like it could have been a really good
game, but supposedly it was not
a good state. We don't really know because the
publisher saying that it's not a good state does not really
(19:34):
lend a lot of like, confidence in it. Because it could be
good. The, the publishers or the higher ups just don't know how to play it
or it could be terrible and they're just like, this is not good. We
just don't really know. But man, going from human head to doing
Prey 2 to going to ZeniMax Online Studios to being laid
off when Bethesda was bought out. Brutal.
(19:57):
Feel sorry for you guys, but that's
where we're at. All right, so
Lexar is launching The Aries Pro M
22280 PCIe
E 5.0 NVMe SSD because
names don't matter for these things. Product
(20:19):
was revealed at Gamescom 2025. The SSD is going to be using
gen 5x4 interface.
Larry's Pro SSD is available in three sizes. The 1 terabyte, 2
terabyte, 4 terabyte. The 1 terabyte version has speed reads up to
14,000 megabytes per second. Read speeds up to
7,500 megabytes per second. The 2 terabyte model is up
(20:41):
to same 1,14,000 megabytes per second. For read
speed, the write speed is 10,000 megabytes per second. And
the 4 terabyte model, it can write up to 11,000
megabytes per second. It's going to be the same speed as
the previous ones. The 1 TB model can handle
1600k random read operations and
(21:04):
1000 random write operations. The the
2 TB model can handle 2000 random read
operations and 1400 random write operations. And the
4K model can handle 2000 random read operations
& 1500 random write operations per
second. So
(21:26):
the drives are expected to last for
1.5 million hours before failing. That's
quite a bit. And the SSD is compatible with Microsoft Direct Storage. It if
the computer meets the requirements. So you have that as well.
And this is supposed to bridge the gap between gaming and content
creation. If it does and if it reads at
(21:47):
those speeds, great. But it's an
SSD drive doesn't have to be specific to gaming or content creation. If it's just
fast, who cares? But I mean, they have to do this. So they can either
charge more or make it sound better. I mean, I get it.
You're marketing it to a specific
group of people. And you need to make it sound like it's fast. It's going
(22:09):
to work great for gaming and content creation. And
it only does 1 terabyte, 2 terabyte and 4 terabytes. So it's going to be
expensive because when you get into
terabyte range for NVMEs,
it always is more expensive. So
if you're looking for one, you're gonna, it's gonna cost you a pretty
(22:32):
penny, but it could meet your standards.
To me, I think it's only really good for like
storage or if you're gonna be doing like, need something
really fast to do a lot of like video data
through it or if you just wanna boot it up as your main drive for
your computer. I really don't see much of it from a
(22:55):
gaming perspective because it just doesn't seem like it uses
all of it to be really worth it. On that side of it, you could
use a standard ssd, not an mvme, but an
SSD and you really wouldn't know the difference.
So we'll see how well these actually do. But it's good they actually using
Microsoft Direct storage. So at least you get that bonus if you want
(23:17):
to spend the money. No real word on what it's going to
cost, but it's probably going to cost, I would say $400 to
$800, give or take.
All right, moving on to layoffs. So
Firaxis Games is going through layoffs, the developer of the
civilization series, because Civ 7 did not meet expectations
(23:40):
whatsoever. And the spokesman stated that there was a staff
reduction as Studio restructures and optimizes its development process.
The exact number of layoffs is not disclosed, but sources indicate
that dozens of workers have been affected. Several developers, including
Emma Kidwell, Logan Blackwood,
Matthew Davis and Maya H, have publicly mentioned being laid
(24:03):
off on LinkedIn. Take Two, the parent company of
2K, projected about 5%
growth in revenue and net bookings for the year ending March
31, 2025, despite delaying Grand Theft Auto
6 to 2026. Other studios under
2K, such as Cat Daddy Games and Cloud Chamber, have also
(24:26):
experienced layoffs in 2025. A Bloomberg report indicated
that BioShock 4 recently failed a publisher review,
which led to leadership changes and concerns about potential
layoffs. Yeah, is that looking good for BioShock
4? Because looks like
it did not meet the standards whatsoever and looks like it's going to be a
(24:48):
long way off for we actually see anything about it. So
if you're looking for a new BioShock, you're going to be waiting a very long
time for a new BioShock. Unfortunately Kevin Levine is not
really. Or his development studio isn't really involved with this
whatsoever. Last one was a while
ago. I don't remember the name of it but it was. It was basically the
(25:10):
sky one. I didn't really like the story very much. I thought it was
pedantic and didn't really understand
religion very well. But the
game, the gameplay was great. Just the story was just a mess
and it was a. It was a philosophical mess of
just inaccuracies and. And just. It was just trite
(25:32):
religion as like the main thing was just. Was just right.
It's been done before and I it was dumb.
I love Kevin living it all. I love that he made like all the. All
the great games of Thief and
was that superhero one. It was Freedom Force. That's what it was
that one and other ones
(25:56):
like System Shock as well. He was part of
that one. Like he made a lot of great games. No
hate for him. It's just that story just did not resonate with me. I
the original BioShock story was great. BioShock 2 was okay.
And then this one which I don't remember the name BioShock something I
don't really remember the name story was just
(26:18):
not as good. But the original
BioShock great story would
probably should just remake that one to be honest with you
would help out so much. But moving on to
the main thing about the stupid monkey
(26:38):
titles of AAA Double A now again
Quadruple A. So the co founder of
developer Digital referred to GTA 6 as quadruple
A game suggesting it surpasses traditional
AAA game and budget cultural impact and scope.
You could say that for the Witcher 3. You could say that for Metal Gear.
(27:01):
You could say that for Bioshock. You could say it for a lot of them.
It's Grand Theft Auto is not
in a pinnacle of its own. Like you could say Call of
Duty has a bigger cultural impact than or I
wouldn't say bigger but it was. It's on par with it
because every time it comes out with a new game every year,
(27:23):
people buy it a lot. They play it a lot. It has a huge
cultural impact. I get that Grand Theft Auto has its
own little thing, but if we're talking about real cultural impact,
I think it's not as big as some of the other ones.
Like design wise it started
the open world game. I'll give it that. It did a great job of starting
(27:45):
that and that is the biggest cultural impact it's had.
Satire, fine, but I mean, no one really remembers the satire of it
that much. As much as it has. They remember, like the
gameplay. They remember basically
being open world, doing what you want with stealing cars, and
basically treating horrors like terribly and all that other stuff
(28:08):
it. It did. That's the cultural impact that it's actually had.
But there's been other ones. I mean, System Shock
was not as big because gaming wasn't as big as it was when System Shock
came out. But it was still a cultural impact in the gaming community.
Now you're talking about the biggest cultural impacts. Halo, Call of
(28:28):
Duty are probably the two biggest ones that have
had major impact. Then you have Fortnite. That has a major
cultural impact because just of the inflection point that it did,
Overwatch, with hero shooters making it extremely
popular than Marvel Rivals, because it's bringing Marvel to
gaming in a good way as well.
(28:50):
Witcher 3 on RPGs because of the way it
handled tough storylines and just kind
of the more, I guess, dark fantasy
versions of it. And then you have Mass Effect
and kind of the Space Odyssey and that cultural impact on it.
Like you've had a lot of different ones and they all had their very specific
(29:11):
impact. But to say that GTA
itself is like the pinnacle of cultural impact.
Not really so. But it does have a cultural impact.
You cannot deny that. But it's like the scope of it.
I mean, you could say Red Dead Redemption 2 has had a
huge cultural impact too. I mean, these all. All these games have had
(29:34):
different cultural impacts at certain times.
But to say I'm thinking about like all these games all the time. No, I
mean here and gone, basically. I
mean, a lot of people still play GTA 5 because of the online
component of it. And that's great, but
(29:54):
to me,
and maybe because I'm older, but it just doesn't have. Maybe because I just
never finished a GTA game. I don't know why I. I
go play it and then I just never finish it.
I don't know why I never finish it. I think I just get bored or
something else that I really want to play goes. And I just forget about it.
(30:15):
And I go, oh, crap, I gotta finish. I gotta restart this game because I
have no idea how to do anything anymore. I mean, it's not that.
That hard of a game to figure out. It's just. I just forget
about it every time. I never
finished. I've never finished a Grand Theft Auto game.
Never. I finished Ghost of Tsushima like
(30:36):
four times. I finished Witcher 3, like four times.
I finished Dragon Age Origins several times. I mean, there's
different games. I finished way more often than I did with that. But
anyways, it doesn't need a new
Monkear. Like Ubisoft tried to do this. It didn't
work. They don't need to do this again. Yes.
(31:00):
Is Grand Theft Auto the pinnacle of AAA games? Yes.
Is it on par with a lot of other pinnacles of AAA games?
Yes. Like Call of Duty, like Halo, like
Fortnite. You could definitely consider Fortnite a AAA game.
It just never ends. But you have like the top tier of
them. Some good, some bad. I
(31:22):
would not put Call of Duty as a good category. I would just call it
because of the cultural impact of it, of there's gonna be a movie
about it of every year.
There's a huge swath of ads and Mountain
Dew and all these other product placements for it. I mean,
if you want to talk about cultural impact, it's when
(31:44):
like Mountain Dew and all Rockstar and all these other ones
put codes in it for your game. That
to me is a huge cultural impact because it's transcending
just that, gaming like Grand Theft Auto. I don't
remember anything and I could be wrong, but I don't remember any
other product placement outside of the game.
(32:07):
Call of Duty. Tons of them.
But I could be wrong and it could change from this one, but we'll
see. Now, will I say that Call of Duty or.
Excuse me, Grand Theft Auto has never had cultural like. No,
no, no. It's a huge cultural impact. I mean, like I said before,
it was the start of the open world game. I mean, that's what popularized
(32:30):
open world. We've never looked back from it after that. After
Grand Theft Auto 3. I mean, that game was a
surprise hit from nowhere that
nobody saw coming. And there were two other games before that and it was a
top down, isometric type of quote unquote open world game. But it did
not have the impact of Grand Theft Auto 3 had. Once
(32:52):
Grand Theft Auto. Grand Theft Auto 3 was released. That
changed everything. That is the cultural point.
But beyond that, I don't really know what else is
there except for it's good. It. It's a very expensive game now,
I think upwards to a billion dollars, I think I've heard. So
(33:12):
it should be a good game. Yes, the gaming industry,
like waits for this game, but we also wait for Call of Duty because we
know it comes out every year. But like, culturally,
I don't Know of a lot of other points that I could
make for this one, and maybe I'm far off on this one, but I.
(33:34):
As a cultural point to it or cultural impact,
I see more cultural impacts from Call of Duty, not because it's a good game,
just because it comes out every year. And just like I said before, I see
more impacts because of where
it's branched out from.
(33:55):
I don't see many things branching out from Grand Theft Auto, if I'm being
really honest. I see games have imitated them,
but games have also imitated Call of Duty. Call of Duty 2 was the first
time we saw regenerative, regenerative health. Before
it was health packs. Kind of like what Overwatch and
Marvel Rivals does, health packs. But then Call of Duty 2 did
(34:18):
regenerative health, where you didn't have to do health packs anymore. And that
was a game changer. When Call of Duty 2 came out,
when Call of Duty 4 came out, that's when they did their kill streaks
and everything. And that was a huge impact on gaming because that
changed Call of Duty forever. And then it just got
more popular and more popular and more popular. This is before they did every year
(34:41):
release. And then after, I think Modern Warfare 2, they did a yearly release
and it got more popular. The inflection point for even then was then Black
Ops, because that was an interesting thing. And then
there are a few other ones. And I think modern warfare in
2019 was another huge cultural moment within
Call of Duty. But even for Grand Theft Auto, the cultural
(35:04):
impacts is every five years or so,
there's a new game from them in the. In the
Grand Theft Auto world. I know they. They do a lot
of painstaking things to make this game really good. But
beyond just the release of games, I don't know what other
(35:25):
cultural impacts it actually has had. Beyond
when three came out and you people were
like, oh, you could do this because it's open world. That was the novelty of
it. And then online, where you could play with
friends, do things, do crazy things. That was another cultural impact.
(35:46):
But six, I mean, it's still a question mark and how good
it's actually going to be. Are people gonna buy it? Of course they are. It's
Grand Theft Auto. It's like Call of Duty. When that thing comes out, you're like,
bye. Not so much Call of Duty anymore, but it used to be Call of
Duty used to be that way for a lot of people.
But I'm just sick and tired of
(36:07):
quadruple A or 5A games or whatever. We're going to monk here.
Just leave it. AAA games. People understand the term stop
making more A's just because you're trying to say it's this pinnacle
of something because it just gets convoluted. Nobody really
cares anymore. It's.
It's aaa. It's top tier aaa, but it's aaa.
(36:31):
So where is this all going? Well, we'll see when grabs that auto
six comes out. How much of a cultural impact this will have being
so far gone from when five came out to this one. How
well it's received by gamers, how much of an impact it has
on the general society of it. Because
I can guarantee you people know Call of Duty more than they
(36:54):
know Grand Theft Auto. Because Call of Duty is just everywhere that
cultural impact is felt. This one
not as much, but there is impact on it. And
that's where I stand on this. I'm not saying that Call of Duty is great.
I'm just talking about impact in general.
But what do you think? Do you think I just missed the boat and
(37:17):
Grand Theft Auto has a bigger cultural impact than I think could happen?
Let me know in the comments below. But thank you for listening to Digital
Coffee Gaming Brew. I really do appreciate it. As always. Please subscribe to this podcast
and all your favorite podcasting apps. If you 5 star review will disrupt the rankings.
Let me know how I'm doing and join me next week as I talk about
what's going on in the PC gaming industry. All right guys, stay safe. Get to
(37:37):
playing the games you want to play and see you next week later.
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